Andrews says flight delay reduction exaggerated

Official estimates of how much a controversial airspace redesign would shave off future flight delays have been greatly exaggerated, said U.S. Rep. Robert Andrews, D-1st Dist., of Haddon Heights, Wednesday afternoon.

"These numbers are shockingly wrong," said Andrews.

The Federal Aviation Administration has attempted to justify their controversial airspace redesign project by explaining that simplifying the airspace and drafting new flight paths would reduce future delays by 12 million minutes, or three to six minutes per flight.

Hours before the FAA would host its first public meeting on the redesign in South Jersey, Andrews explained that, according to the FAA's own data, the airspace redesign project would save only 2.5 million minutes of future delays in 10 years, or 30 seconds per flight in the Philadelphia region.

The average delay is 22 minutes.

"The FAA has exaggerated by a factor of five or six the alleged benefit of it doing this airspace redesign," said Andrews. "What this means is the FAA is willing to spend hundreds of millions of dollars and disrupt the lives of the people in the Delaware Valley for a savings of 30 seconds."

FAA officials did not return calls seeking comment on these accusations.

The FAA will hold its first public meeting on their proposed airspace redesign project at 6:30 p.m. at the Crowne Plaza Cherry Hill on the Marlton Pike in Cherry Hill.